GOD, formatting is a pain. Any incredibly generous volunteers? When it's all written, of course.

Hi there. Here’s a guide to the Centaur Warchief. (Henceforth referred to as CW/Brad/Cent)

About me

This part is just a brief intro on me to assure you I’m not some 6 six year old with an imba command of the English language guidetrolling you.
I’ve been playing DotA since 2006, meddling in pubs and stuff. Even now, I am primarily a pub player, and I think much of PD are elitist bastards. In Singapore, at least, pubs are not entire noobfests. Granted, there are boot1st people, but there is also an appreciation for finer things like juking and stuff. So keep your mind open and take a read through this guide from a pubstomper.

Intro

CW is by no means my fav hero or whatever. But he is one of those heroes that piss me off when people get the wrong items on him. A close second would be Naga with bfuries. So you could say that this guide is mainly to propose an alternate and (I believe) much better itembuild from Cent.

Let’s take a look at Cent’s roles:
Tanker
Initiator
Instagibber

The role “tanker” is actually really hard to pin down. Importantly, a tanker must do the following:
1) Draw fire
2) Not die immediately after step 1

The purpose of step 1 is to allow the squishier members of your team to survive, because aggression is targeted at you instead. The problem is, the only hero that can truly carry out step 1 is Axe, because of his call. Other than that, the enemy always has the liberty to choose who to attack. Step 2 is where CW excels in.

So Cent has quite a tough job. To do something that none of his skills technically allow him to. But players are human, and thus we can exploit how the human mind works to make your enemies focus you. More on that later.

Next, initiator. This is quite a no brainer. Your blinkstomp/forcestomp starts the teamfight off, and then everyone jumps into the fray.

Lastly, instagibber. No kidding. Cent is a rather good source of burst damage early game, thanks to his stompedge combo. This is, of course, if you choose the skill build that provides him the stompedge combo in the first place. Which brings us to the skillbuilds.

The standard build
1. Stomp
2. Edge
3. Edge
4. Stomp
5. Edge
6. Fortitude
7. Edge
8. Stomp
9. Stomp
Then max out Return, adding Fortitude when you can.

This should be the standard CW skillbuild which works for both light roaming and aggressive laning because it allows you to net kills early if your enemies make the mistake of getting too aggressive or if your ally has a disable. I heavily recommend this build because

a) your manapool can take it
b) it makes you a threat early
c) it helps out any roamers on your team.

The alternate skillbuild would be a more defensive one, which I’m not going to explicitly list out, because it requires your own judgment.

If your lane partner is a defensive one (like Bloodseeker/Silencer), you might choose to take Stats/Return over Edge, because a) you can’t get close enough to use edge and b) using the stunedge combo doesn’t kill off your enemy because your ally doesn’t have a source of burst damage. So which do you take in place of Edge? At least one point should be put in Return, because then you get the base damage, regardless of your strength.

Itembuilds:

Starting items
Branch
Branch
Branch
Branch
and...

Branch.

In total, 5 of them.

Orly?

Ya rly.

I think it's easy to agree that Branch is one of the most imba items in DotA, based on the cost-benefit ratio. If heroes had no inventory limit, everyone will be buying 1576958026052790 branches every game.

So it's great that this item build allows you to buy 5 copies of the MOST IMBA ITEM IN GAME and not have to sell them back.

These 5 branches become...

Early game items

Wand
Headdress of Rejuvenation
Narezim Buckler

And along the way you get your Treads.

Also, you can get the following if no one else on your team is going to.

Urn
Jango

WTFUX meka on centaur?

Yes, indeed.

With the removal of Edge's manacost but yet no int nerf to Centaur, he suddenly finds himself plenty of mana to spare. Meka is thus a great way to make use of that mana because

a) Its armor has good synergy with your raw HP
b) You're often in the middle of the fight and so is in the best position to use Meka
c) It's made of BRANCHES

Anyway, as you can see above, I've listed the Meka components, but not Meka itself. You can choose to make Meka itself as soon as you think it's gonna be needed in minor skirmishes. Till then you can keep it unassembled, because the parts are pretty good on their own too.

Mid game items

So you've got your basic cheap items. Next: initiating tools.

Namely: Forcestaff or Blinkdagg

So which do you want? If your team has a setup stun like Storm Bolt or something, you don't have to be as precise and can thus go for Forcestaff. But if you team really badly needs the element of surprise (for example, if you're supposed to be the one starting off a disable chain on their Anti-Mage) or has no setup stun, get Blink.

It's pointless arguing over whether Blink's active ability > Force's active ability because even after you take into account things like Forcestaff being able to push other people and not getting cancelled by enemy damage, it's obvious that Blink is better.

Which is why Forcestaff enjoys an easier buildup and bonus stats. It's called balance. If Force's active was better than Blink and yet still had better buildup and stats, it'll be pretty unfair.

Late game items/Extensions

- Blademail

If you're great at drawing enemy aggro, this item makes it even more worth your while.

- Radiance

Sometimes, your enemy realizes that you become a nonissue after your initiation. Get this is make yourself a very real threat. Kinda sucks to get it late, though.

- Heart

Not the most strategically multifaceted of items. To tank up even more. Adds a fair bit to Return.

- Shiva
- Assault

Gives you a bunch of armor, which you'll like. However, make sure the other abilities are at least somewhat relevant before getting them.

-Necrobook

A very fine choice, especially if you got Jango earlier on. Counters the usual invisible dudes + supports that try to dish in damage while keeping their distance from the teamfight. The blue dude could very well kill them.

Rejected items

-Vanguard

SRSLY?

Fk yea, seriously.

I truly think Meka is superior to Vanguard. And that belief can be proven via mathcraft, calculating for EHP/gold. (I'll get around to that sometime soon. Prolly will need the help of some mechfags, because they usually also are mathfags.)

But even if it turns out that Vanguard is mathematically more efficient in increasing your EHP than Meka, Mek can still be considered to be better because you simply can't quantify the advantages of the AoE heal and the easier buildup. On the other hand, Vanguard's stats are mostly easily quantified.

I hope I don't sound too obstinate here. I'm still open to intelligent arguments that say Vang is better.

- BKB

You're a tank. If you're immune to magic, Venge throws that stun at poor Rylai instead. :'(

Do your part in saving Rylai by being as much a disable-magnet can you can. And that means being magic unimmune. Lol.

- The usual DPS shit

Buriza, MKB, etc.

You're not Wisp. Only a hard carry like Io gets these items.

Gameplay

Early game:

Pick a lane.

As I've said above, it's best if you hang with a dude that can set you up for your stomp. It can lead to a great earlygame, which gives you precious momentum for the rest of the game. I guess Cent could do okay in a trilane, but Double Edge becomes alot more risky if you're against another trilane too.

Mid game:

Go around ganking with a target stunner. Feel free to act as bait to incite teamfights, because it takes quite a while to bring you down. When the enemy gathers around to gank you, your allies can come in and countergank. Stomp, back off and heal yourself with an Urn charge and get back in there. Watch your allies and Meka is needed. However, remember that you don't have the option of killing yourself will Edge if things go bad.

In terms of farming, you should be getting more farm than Rylai but not as much as Spec. Just strike a balance.

Late game:

Blink/force in to initiate teamfights. Get in people's faces and get those disables and nukes aimed at you. Every Hex/Storm Bolt/Magic Missle/Ensnare/Laguna that you receive means one more that your allies didn't. At this point you'll find yourself dying slightly more often if the enemy carry has gotten fat but do not despair. If you went down first in the teamfight and yet still put up a fight, (a fight = stomp, egde, blademail, etc) you probably already did a fine job of tanking.

Allies

You'll love any target stunner.

In addition, Tiny and Tuskar both get you into the heart of the teamfight in epic ways. Although Tiny might want to save his toss for his combo.

Enemies

Naix eats you with feast and Rage easily dodges Stomp.

Necrolyte halves the amount of damage it takes to kill you, which is :'( You can get back at him with a well timed blademail, though.

Witch Doctor isn't much of a problem if not for his Maledict. Usually the spell just results in overkill and wasted resources in a gank but against you, it's actually largely responsible for your death. Use Meka before the first damage tick to minimize the pain.

Manaburners render you rather redundant. Thank god Forcestaff/Buckler hardly costs any mana and Edge is completely free.

Conclusion

This guide was intended mainly to propose the skillbuild and itembuild that deviated from the norm slightly. I had a decent time writing this guide, and look forward to doing ones on more complex heroes.

Acknowledgments

Thanks, Ice, for making an awesome game.

And also, here's a thank you in advance to whoever can help me with the formatting and general sprucing up of this guide.